Bogotá Madrid Fusión (BMF) is a commercial and promotional platform of the Chamber of Commerce of Bogotá (CCB), in partnership with Spain's Vocento Group, to turn the city into Latin America's epicenter of gastronomy; bringing together several national and international cooks and chefs to promote creative talent and exalt the country's biodiversity as a pantry, and cuisine as a life experience.
This initiative is part of the CCB's commitment to supporting and strengthening the Creative Industries that began more than 15 years ago with business platforms such as ARTBO, Bogotá Audiovisual Market (BAM), Bogotá Music Market (BOmm) and Bogotá Fashion Week (BFW) which are currently benchmarks in Colombia and Latin America.
Bogotá Madrid Fusión
BMF is an initiative carried out jointly with the Vocento Group, the organizer of "Madrid Fusión", Europe's main Haute Cuisine Congress. Bogotá Madrid Fusión, a four-day event, aims to exalt the diversity of Colombian gastronomy, and will be attended by 20 of the best chefs from Europe, Asia and America, who will give lectures and workshops and live cooking sessions to share their experience with attendees, as well as provide an area of gastronomic experiences open to the general public, which will bring citizens and visitors closer to different gastronomic proposals of the Colombian territory and that they will have the opportunity to taste.
Haute Cuisine Congress
This event, which will take place at Corferias, a subsidiary of the Bogotá Chamber of Commerce, will feature different spaces and scenarios designed to exhibit the country's culinary richness. One of them is the Haute Cuisine Congress, a meeting aimed at food professionals, which will take place on November 7 and 8 from 9:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and from 2:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
The academic agenda will bring together more than 1,400 attendees, and 20 chefs and cooks widely recognized on the national and international sphere for their expertise in the gastronomic scene, who will participate in the ten 40-minute presentations that will be carried out daily.
Master workshops
Between Saturday, November 9 and Sunday, November 10, 18 master workshops will be held, conceived as opportunities for food lovers, professionals and students with basic knowledge can learn first-hand with great chefs from the national and international scene.
Business roundtable and gastronomic networking
The business roundtable and networking activities will also have an important space in the context of Bogotá Madrid Fusión. This session is expected to welcome approximately 100 pacesetters from Bogotá region, from companies across the value chain of the restaurant sector with products or services framed in the following segments: supply (agricultural and agri-business industry), logistics, equipment, containers and packaging, tourism and digital media, to name a few.
Trade fair
The exhibition spaces and the trade fair will complement the business offer that attendees can find during the course of this event. This scenario is expected to be attended by 20,000 visitors, who will have the opportunity to live different gastronomic experiences such as tastings and combinations that will be led by more than 100 exhibitors representing machinery and equipment manufacturers, and suppliers of meat, poultry, fruits, processed foods and cooking utensils, among others.
Gastronomic experiences
During the four days of Bogotá Madrid Fusión, attendees can enjoy a space of gastronomic experiences, where they will find restaurants from different regions of the country with innovative proposals that exalt the use of local ingredients and traditional techniques, with the possibility of tasting some of their best dishes. This is the best place to spend time with friends and family around cultural activities, contests and good food.
Commitment to Cultural and Creative Industries
Over the last 15 years, the Chamber of Commerce of Bogotá has had a strong commitment to Cultural and Creative Industries. Therefore, the entity provides ongoing support to companies in the sector to strengthen them, improve the business environment and make platforms available for trade circulation, business contacts and training such as ARTBO, Bogotá Audiovisual Market-BAM, Bogotá Music Market-BOmm, Bogotá Fashion Week-BFW and soon, Bogotá Madrid Fusión.
The Chamber works with these sectors through cluster initiatives, based on which actors from the public, private and academic sectors address the gaps that restrain the companies’ competitiveness in these clusters. In particular, for the gastronomy sector, the CCB leads the Gastronomy Cluster initiative. This initiative (cluster) is, in turn, part of the Intelligent Specialization Strategy of Bogotá-Cundinamarca, the productive development agenda that aims to trigger productivity in the region through a focus on five areas, one of which is the area called "Creative Bogotá region", to which the gastronomy sector belongs.
